Past Faceoffs

Predictions

Torpedo have been making a good name for themselves in the scene as of late, and they’re like Team Acer back in 2015 who were an all Swedish team and they played very well and occasionally upset T1 teams. Although we haven’t seen Torpedo play a T1 team, they have the motivation and the skill to compete at a pretty high level (low-mid T2 on the spectrum).

Torpedo caught my eye when they won the ESL Nordic Finals in late 2015 after beating the Danish NoProblem! From there they have gone on to win against the likes of CW, Publicr, Alternate Attax, Orgless, ENCE and also tied against Vexed in a BO2. Their most recent game was today and it was a loss to Publicr 14-16 on Cache in the LB Round 4 for CEVO.

In that match, atter went nuts and dropped 33 kills while the rest of the team couldn’t even hit 20 kills with the second highest fragger being at just 19 kills and the bottom fragger at 16. Consistent frags for the other 4 than atter but they would’ve won if everyone else had stepped up just a notch. Never the less though, that was a really good match for atter and 33 frags is mind boggling.

Copenhagen Wolves

For the matches that CW will be playing today, they will be having two stand ins. G1ave won’t be playing because of medical issues and HUNDEN will also be MIA for whatever reason. Taking their place will be tabu and Niko. The T2 Danish scene is quite tight and I would assume that all have played together or at the very least have some chemistry over the course of 10 years in CS.

Tabu was dropped from Orgless and replaced with SKYTTEN and this was just announced under a week ago. He couldn’t keep up with the rest of that squad because of schooling commitments. Niko isn’t the Niko that plays on Mouz. The only history we have on this guy is that he played for EZMarket and he was mainly the top fragger in the matches he played with them.

HUNDEN was the IGL for this team I would assume and losing an IGL is always a big deal even if they’re not too great frag wise. Individual skill wise, this roster is looking pretty stacked.

History

It was only on the 4th of this month that Torpedo and CW faced off in a BO3 series in Operation Kinguin #2. Torpedo only just won after a relatively tight game 2-1. Rosters are all the same of course since this game only just happened (HUNDEN and G1ave were playing in that match though).

Final thoughts and advice

Two stand ins is quite a big change and there is a good chance that this roster is just going to play these 4 maps like it’s a PUG. I hope Torpedo do play better though, because relying on atter to do all the work isn’t very favorable because if he’s not playing to the best of his ability, then the team will crumble and have a small chance of winning.

It’ll be close for sure, and I’m not sure if the two games on lounge is an error or not, but playing 4 maps against the same opponents will get tiring by the third map. It’s more of a coin toss at the moment but I’m going to favor Torpedo here purely because of the stand ins CW is having to roster on this late. Fingers crossed atter’s team mates will be playing a tad better than they did today.

Torpedo

Torpedo is kinda your up and coming Swedish team right now, sure thing there is Ancient, but if you want raw undiscovered talent, this is where you would go. Not many of these guys are too know, however for quite some time now they have been grinding out results versus some top opposition, and just in general seemingly improving. Torpedo had a really close loss versus Ence the other day, which was just unfortunately, however digging further deep, you see that they have beaten Ence 2-0 before, Publicir, Orgless and what not in pretty recent history, so their results are most definitely impressive. For me going into this matchup, Torpedo should be the favorites, mainly due to the situations CW find themselves right now, and especially their current form. I would not favor them too heavily here honestly, however it is a BO2, and for them to drop two maps to a CW who have two standins, that would be quite disappointing.

CW

So Glaive and Hunden are not playing here, instead it will be Tabu and Niko playing. Obviously not the Niko from Mouz, however this Niko is actually quite decent to be honest. I’ve seen him play a bit here and there, he seems to be a common standin option right now, and the guys aim is insane at times, definitely somebody to keep your eye on. Tabu himself is quite good too, obviously he is an upgrade to Hunden in terms of fragging, however eh. These two standins bring firepower for sure, however while Hunden is the memestar for his poor fragging abilities, his in-game capabilities do not seem too shabby at all, and it is always difficult to play properly without your caller, so I’m not really sure how that will work out. I do not really like betting on teams with standins as it makes them more unpredictable, however I feel that CW has a good chance here, for at least a map if not both. It all just really depends how we see this team perform, two standins is quite a bit, and trying to accurately predict how they will play is difficult, so we have to play it patient.

Conclusion

Overall I feel like in this BO2, I wouldn’t be too too surprised if Torpedo did not pickup a map here, however I would expect that they do. CW has two standins here, and it is not simply for their entry fragger, no, their in-game leader is not playing, which is never good. A IGL is somebody who really dictates the team and often guides them to their success, and if you take that away, obviously the team suffers. For me this is a 60-40 or so in favor of Torpedo, even though this is a BO2 game, it is a risky game. It is hard to try and predict how CW will play, they have a skill increase but eh, how much does that go for. 60-40 game, high risk, play the odds here.

Bet

Just going to play the odds here. Given that I give this match a 60-40, as long as Torpedo is below 65%, I will drop 2-3% on them, otherwise if they are above that, I will go 2-3% on CW in the hopes of an upset. It is a BO2, so if it ends 1-1, it returns your skins so that is a bit more security.

Torpedo are a side that impressed me but had a few strange results the last days. They threw a massive lead against Publiclir in a game that I thought they had already closed out. Their opponent today is CW, who will be playing with 2 stand-ins. Niko is a really impressive up coming talent, and I expect big things from him. The other stand-in is tabu, who was last seen playing for PF. I do expect CW to take a quite pug based map such as D2 or Cache, and I think they have a good chance at taking a map like this.

I think Torpedo, although are a good side, seem to be mentally weak still, and if CW can start well, I have a feeling they could take 1 map in this series. It is a risky game, and a risky bet, but with the real odds in my head being 60-40, and the current odds being 70-30, I would suggest going LOW on CW as I feel they will be rested from LAN, and there is an awful lot of fire power in their roster.